


If Vision Is The Only Validation

by roachpatrol



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Exhibitionism, F/M, PWP, Voyeurism, Xeno, Xenophilia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-12
Updated: 2011-10-12
Packaged: 2017-10-24 13:02:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/263782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roachpatrol/pseuds/roachpatrol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>CG: HARLEY, WHEN I SAID THAT I WOULD RATHER CULL MYSELF WITH THE DULL END OF A SCALEMATE BEFORE I EVER GAVE YOU THE CHANCE TO RECOIL IN ABJECT REVULSION BEFORE MY HIDEOUS VISAGE<br/>CG: WHAT THE FUCK GAVE YOU THE IDEA THAT I WOULD SOMEHOW BE AMENABLE TO INSTEAD PERFORMING A DAPPER SHOW AND TELL ROUTINE?</p>
            </blockquote>





	If Vision Is The Only Validation

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the homestuck kinkmeme prompt: Jade uses her spectagoggles to spy on Karkat in a compromising position.
> 
> Thanks to Meowgon for the excellent beta-job.
> 
>  _i look up into the night sky  
>  and see a thousand eyes staring back  
> and all around these golden beacons  
> i see nothing but black_
> 
>  _i feel a way of something beyond them  
>  i don't see what i can feel  
> if vision is the only validation  
> then most of my life isn't real..._
> 
>  _\--Black and Gold,_ Sam Sparro

Trolls don't look that much like humans, is the first thing that she notices.

The second thing is that considering all the other things in the universe they might have looked like-- like jellyfish or spacewhales or slime molds or whatever-- they do actually look almost entirely human. But Jade figures it's probably human nature to get all hung up on the little differences, humans all probably look so similar to each other-- compared to, like, slime molds-- that the human brain is wired to pick up even the teenie weenie details. Rose would probably know better.

Oh, god, Rose can never know about this, she will be sooooo smug and probably try to talk about how sometimes Jade still sleeps with her manthro chaps in bed with her and also that one time Jade thought 'taking the knot' was a metaphor for getting married and made a really, really terrible joke.

Karkat looks a lot like a manthro chap, actually, something subtly _other_ about every part of him, and that's not even taking into account the little nubby orange horns. Jade fusses with her goggles, focuses closer. It's different when she's really looking at someone real, someone totally physical and awake. In the dreambubbles everything shifts and warps, everything's symbolic. Feferi was a bright cartoon girl, drawing and redrawing herself endlessly as she floated and giggled, a scribble of wide white eyes and voluminous hair, triangle teeth like a cartoon.

But Karkat is real. He's sitting in some stairwell or another in the veil, his head leaned against the wall, some kind of big alien laptop balanced on his knees. He looks tired. His skin is grey all over, not like cement or elephants or cloudy skies but like fine faded velvet, the fuzz of it lengthening out around his jaw and where his wild black hair bristles out in ever direction, downy short and much darker around his big yellow eyes. His lips are shiny-black as goth makeup and the teeth that press into them are big long fangs, almost tusks, pale cream-white and just a bit yellowish at the bases. Wet-- one of his eyeteeth is a little crooked, another one is a little chipped. He licks his lips, a flash of wet dark-gray tongue, and he looks around with big flat-yellow eyes like an owl's and his eyelashes are so _long._

He's pretty. He's totally alien and really, incredibly, adorably pretty.

Jade hops up to perch on a wide welcoming curve of blue-green baobab roots, and grins.

GG: hi karkat!

At that he startles-- she can't hear him, but she can see his mouth flash all teeth, his eyes snap wide and then narrow. He peers at his screen. She angles her view around and then she can see herself on his computer, like a mirror reflecting mirrors, a small girl in a snuggly red coat perched in the great teal sweep of a tree.

CG: OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE, WHAT NOW?  
  
GG: guess what I'm looking at! ;D  
  
CG: YOU'RE GAPING AT A SNOWBANK LIKE A MORON.  
  
CG: DO I WIN?  
  
CG: ARE WE DONE HERE?

Jade laughs, and watches Karkat watch herself laughing. She points at her goggles, and feels a heady rush of vertigo as the girl in the monitor does too. No lag at all, just the smooth transition of sciency magic, and Karkat tilts his head so slowly to one side as he realizes.

CG: OH FUCK ME  
  
CG: YOU'RE ACTUALLY SPYING ON ME WITH THOSE MONSTROSITIES, AREN'T YOU?  
  
GG: bingo!!

She waves at empty space, then slouches back and folds her hands over her chest. After a little concentration, she gets a split screen going so she can watch herself over Karkat's shoulder and also peer up at his face at the same time. It makes her head feel hot and thickly triumphant, like when she can finally get a physics equation to balance just right.

GG: touch yourself for me!

she says, and Karkat's big gold eyes go so wide. Is that a blush under all the grey?

CG: WHAT.  
  
GG: i want to see how you work!  
  
CG: HARLEY, WHEN I SAID THAT I WOULD RATHER CULL MYSELF WITH THE DULL END OF A SCALEMATE BEFORE I EVER GAVE YOU THE CHANCE TO RECOIL IN ABJECT REVULSION BEFORE MY HIDEOUS VISAGE  
  
CG: WHAT THE FUCK GAVE YOU THE IDEA THAT I WOULD SOMEHOW BE AMENABLE TO INSTEAD PERFORMING A DAPPER SHOW AND TELL ROUTINE?  
  
GG: probably the fact that you always give in if i ask you nice!  
  
CG: LIES AND FILTHY SLANDER.  
  
GG: please, karkat?  
  
GG: pleeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaassssssssse?  
  
CG: STOP. DESIST. ABORT.  
  
GG: pretty please? it doesn't have to be anything big you can just like pull on your ears or something!  
  
GG: do you even have ears under all that hair??  
  
CG: IT IS NOT 'HAIR', IT IS FOLLICULAR CRANIAL PROTRUSIONS, OH MY GOD, WHAT ARE YOU, SOME KIND OF SNOOTY DUCHESS?  
  
GG: maybe I am!  
  
GG: i am the duchess of snoot and you are my knight in shining turtleneck.  
  
GG: come on, wiggle your ears at me just once!  
  
CG: WILL YOU SHUT UP IF I DO?  
  
GG: well i certainly won't if you don't :P  
  
CG: YOU DRIVE A HARD BARGAIN, SHE-WITCH. 

Karkat settles back from his husktop, and kind of looks vaguely around, as if trying to determine where she's looking at him from. His dark bristly eyebrows are knitted together, and one corner of his mouth is halfway to a snarl. It tips over into a full-on grimace as he squares his shoulders and raises his hands up to either side of his head. His bristly hair parts, and his round yellow nails glint against--

GG: OH MY GOD YOU HAVE POINTY EARS!!!!!!  
  
CG: YEAH  
  
CG: SO?  
  
GG: that is the cutest thing!!!!  
  
GG: THE ~~~*CUTEST*~~~ THING!!!!  
  
CG: OH MY FUCKING GOD STOP HAVING AN ANEURYSM THEY'RE JUST CARTILAGINOUS HEAR HANDLES.  
  
CG: LET ME GUESS YOU LOST YOURS IN SOME KIND OF PITIABLE WIGGLERHOOD TRAUMA AND NOW THE ONLY THING THAT FILLS THE GAPING AURAL VOID IN YOUR WRETCHED EXCUSE OF A LIFE IS SCOPING OUT EVERYONE ELSE'S HEADFLAPS?  
  
GG: nope!  
  
GG: it's just....  
  
CG: JUST?

He actually chews on his lips with his fangs as he types that, hunching inward, his head tilting to one side. He looks like a cat about to pounce on a laser pointer, she can almost see him twitching with anticipation, and he can see her giggling at him, her hand over her mouth, grinning exactly up at the patch of space she needs to be looking to meet his eyes through the screen. Every minute she delays winds him a little tighter.

GG: .....................just.....  
  
GG: .........................................

He actually wriggles, right in place, like at any moment he is going to explode.

CG: JUST WHAT COME ON HARLEY  
  
GG: ......SO CUTE!!!!!!

He recoils: rocks back in place as if she had punched him square in the snout, then drives forward, attacking the keyboard of his funny crab computer as if each keystroke could punch her right back. Teasing Dave was never this much fun. Karkat is so _expressive!_

CG: OH FUCK OFF AND CHOKE ON A RUSTED BULGE, THEY'RE NOT CUTE.  
  
GG: they are too!  
  
CG: ARE NOT.  
  
GG: are too!!!!!  
  
CG: ARE NOT!  
  
GG: okay so show me something else!  
  
CG: NO  
  
GG: i'm gonna stare at you all day anyway karkat!  
  
CG: WHAT THE FUCK.  
  
GG: take off your shirt!  
  
CG: WHAT  
  
CG: I  
  
GG: scared? >:D  
  
CG: WHAT NO WHAT THE FUCK, HARLEY, NO!  
  
GG: yes!  
  
CG: NO!  
  
GG: YES!!!!  
  
CG: A THOUSAND TIMES DO I DECREE UNTO THEE NO, YOU SPASTIC SPACE VOYEUR.  
  
GG: i'll take off my shirt too.

He pauses at that, blinks a few times. Confusion and hope is written blatantly across his face in letters of fire.

CG: HOW WOULD THAT EVEN MATTER.  
  
CG: WAIT NO DON'T 

Galvanized, Jade grabs the hem of her top and rips it all off in one easy arc that just clears her goggles. For a moment all she feels is triumph, and then the cold hits like a million knives.

GG: oh my GOD it is FUCKING COLD AS FUCK OUT HERE!!!!  
  
CG: YOUR LAND ISN'T CALLED FROST AND FROGS BECAUSE IT'S A BEACH PARTY YOU COMPLETE SHITHIVE LUNATIC!  
  
CG: OH GOD I CAN'T EVEN  
  
CG: JADE PUT YOUR SHIRT ON  
  
GG: NOT UNTIL YOURS COMES OFF!!  
  
CG: JADE  
  
CG: SERIOUSLY COME ON.  
  
GG: DO IT OR MY BOOBS ARE GOING TO FREEZE TO DEATH!!!!!  
  
CG: OKAY FINE!! FUCK!

He pulls his shirt over his head as she puts hers back on, his hair packing down along the curve of his skull and then fluffing back into a wild shock as the shirt moves over his head, the bumps of his horns making funny lumps. He sits on the stairs with his shirt crumpled in his gray fists, his skin bare and smooth. He’s strangely bony, like a living sculpture or a lizard, just gray and sleekly angular all over, and his ribs are strange. Between three of them on either side are dark black streaks, like seams or parenthesis, and they stretch wider and narrower as he breathes. There is a taut intensity to every part of him, each movement he makes, like a dancer or a gymnast flowing from one sharp pose to the next. His arms are longer than a human's would be, it's obvious now that his sleeves are off-- and they don't hinge quite the way it seems like they should. She wonders if his legs are the same deal, if he even has toes on his feet. What if he has paws inside his shoes?

GG: take off your pants too!  
  
CG: OH COME ON!  
  
GG: i did not get nipple frostbite just for one article of clothing!!!  
  
CG: JADE HAS ANYONE TOLD YOU THAT YOU ARE COMPLETELY SCREWLOOSE GRUBFUCKING CRAZYPANTS?  
  
GG: not once. >:P

Which is technically completely true. But the more important thing is that he's almost smiling as he shucks his shoes and then his pants off-- he can see her grinning, it's almost like they're laughing together for real and he seems so much more _relaxed_ than he had been when she first started talking to him. Like he's finally figured out that he doesn't have much choice but to do what she wants him to and he's kind of eager about it, more flustered than furious, more shy than resentful. His legs are long and thin like his arms, and for all that he's got normal little toes with yellow toenails on his feet, he looks nearly froglike, except for his face, his smile, that's not animal at all. That's just Karkat, his face more familiar with each time she looks at him, easier to read. He looks more like he wants to be mad than he actually is mad, anymore, and when he's got nothing on but black alien boxers he sprawls back on the steps, leaning all his weight on one sharp elbow and giving her a heated, challenging stare that makes her stomach do a giddy flip. He is the most adorable thing ever, like candy or squiddles or lolcats. She would watch a million cartoons about him.

CG: SO IS THIS GOING WHERE I THINK IT'S GOING, THEN?  
  
GG: i guess it depends on where you think it's going!

He curls up as fast as a startled clam. She's surprised too-- suddenly he's not even the least bit happy or relaxed.

CG: WHERE I THINK IT'S GOING DEFINITELY HINGES ON WHERE YOU THINK ITS GOING THOUGH.  
  
CG: I MEAN AM I TOTALLY MISREADING THE SITUATION HERE, IS THIS JUST HOW HUMANS SAY HELLO OR SOMETHING  
  
CG: GREETINGS NEW LIFE FORM PLEASE RENDER UNTO US A SAUCY STRIPTEASE  
  
CG: IS THAT HOW IT GOES?

Oh god. Oh god!!!! Jade feels her face go so hot it's a wonder she's not melting the snow all around her for a hundred feet. Karkat's eyes are getting wider and wider, his thin shoulders starting to compact inwards and his fingers squeezing and scratching the edge of his computer as he watches her stare blankly back at him. All the gears in her head have locked up.

GG: uh  
  
CG: UH?  
  
CG: NO NO NO HARLEY COME ON, WHAT'S UH, UH IS NOT GOOD, UH IS NEVER GOOD  
  
CG: OH SHIT I DID FUCKING MISREAD THIS WHOLE THING YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THAT I  
  
CG: FUCK  
  
CG: FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCKING FUCK!  
  
CG: I AM SO SORRY.  
  
GG: no, wait!  
  
GG: i am sorryer  
  
GG: i am the sorriest karkat  
  
CG: FUCK YOU YOU ARE NOT THAT ILLUSTRIOUS TITLE HAS ALREADY BEEN CLAIMED BY MY LAMENTABLE JERKASS.  
  
CG: I AM SORRIEST FOREVER.  
  
CG: AEONS FROM NOW THEY WILL SING TENDER CAUTIONARY BALLADS OF HOW HARD I FUCKED THIS UP.

Huddled into himself like a sad gray pile of ash, all angles and self-loathing, he reaches for his pants again. She makes the only possible decision. It is as simple as balancing an equation, if a and b, then c, if that look on his face and the jerky furious way he's moving, then--

GG: you dipshit!  
  
GG: i meant i'm sorry i don't have any sweet stripper jams for this momentous first contact  
  
GG: it is not how we humans do this at all usually we get a dj  
  
GG: i just wouldn't want you to feel unloved while you shake your groove thang!

Karkat pauses, and sort of slowly and suspiciously inches back into lounge-position.

CG: DON'T YOU DARE CALL STRIDER IN. I WILL FLIP OFF THE GODDAMN HANDLE SO HARD THAT WHEN I COME BACK DOWN EVERY BONE IN MY BODY WILL SHATTER UNDER IMPACT. GIRLS AND SMALL WIGGLERS WILL WEEP, AND EVERY GOVERNMENT IN PARADOX SPACE WILL DECLARE A DAY OF MOURNING.  
  
GG: deal!

He actually smiles at that, a full-on toothy grin, and it makes him so intensely pretty. He looks more alien than ever, all his fangs showing and his nose scrunched up with satisfaction, but the emotion somehow comes through all their differences. It feels wonderful to have put that look on his face.

Then he slides out of his shorts and suddenly his face is the last thing on her mind. He's got this _thing_ between his legs, thick and tapered, and the gray fuzz of the rest of him fades into a slick black along its length. When he runs one finger down it it kind of stirs, getting thicker and longer and curling up into his hand, almost as long as his fingers. He smiles just a bit and squeezes it, his head sort of rolling back and his long eyelashes shuttering down over his eyes. Whatever it is he sure as hell likes what he's doing, and it makes her feel really warm and interested.

GG: so tell me what that is!  
  
CG: YOU DON'T HAVE ONE?  
  
GG: nope!  
  
CG: OH. WELL, THERE GOES THAT LITTLE FANTASY.  
  
CG: I MEAN, UH.  
  
CG: EXTREMELY LITTLE.  
  
CG: MICROSCOPIC.  
  
CG: NONEXISTENT.  
  
GG: suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure, karkat.  
  
CG: THIS IS SO UNFAIR, I HOPE YOU KNOW THAT. I'M PEELED DOWN TO MY FUCKING CORPSEMEAT AND YOU'RE SQUATTING ALL SAFE AND SOUND UP TO YOUR OCCULARS IN SNOW SO THAT I CAN'T EVEN ASK TO SEE YOUR  
  
CG: YOUR YOU  
  
CG: WITHOUT BEING A TOTAL FUCKASS MORON AND GETTING YOU KILLED FROM EXPOSURE.  
  
CG: HOW IS THAT EVEN FAIR ANSWER ME THAT HARLEY.  
  
GG: lol it isn't.  
  
GG: so tell me what's up with your junk!  
  
CG: IT IS NOT MY 'JUNK', THANK YOU EVER SO, DUCHESS SNOOTY VON WORDSMITH.  
  
CG: IT IS MY EXTERNAL REPRODUCTIVE APPARATUS AND I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW IT IS ACTUALLY SOMEWHAT LARGER THAN THE MEDIAN AVERAGE.  
  
GG: it looks like a big slug.  
  
CG: WOW, YOU SURE KNOW HOW TO MAKE A BOY FEEL SPECIAL.  
  
GG: :P

He lets his head fall back against the steps, and wiggles a little, a sinuous snake-like twisting that goes through him from shoulders to hips. His lips move-- he's saying something, to the air, maybe to her. She wishes desperately that her goggles had sound. His throat-- with his head tipped back like that it's a perfect arc, and she can see it twitch with his breaths, his-- moans? His mouth is slack, his lips parted, his eyes distant. His fingers rub at himself slowly, and then pull the thing up against his lower stomach and his hand slides-- beneath--

GG: okay wow what is THAT????  
  
GG: karkat??  
  
GG: >:(  
  
GG: hey come on tell me what's going on!

He only glances at the screen, a slow lazy movement, more looking at her than what she's saying, and then grins lopsidedly and does that wiggling thing again, a captivating display of his bones, his skin, his beautiful alien hands, all big knuckles and square palms, his yellow nails like little round stars, those black crescents on his chest like arcane punctuation. Her face is so hot she can practically hear snowflakes sizzling as they touch on to her skin, and he's totally looking at her while he touches himself, looking at her looking at him. He slips two fingertips inside himself, the dark slit, and they come back _wet_ , glistening candy-pink in the light from his computer screen. She hears a sharp squeaking noise, and realizes that it must have been _her_.

Finally he spares a hand for the keyboard.

CG: FIGURE IT OUT YOURSELF.  
  
GG: you fuckass!  
  
CG: HA.

His head drops back to the steps. He's curled in a loose arc, watching her, and his hands go all over himself, the planes of his chest, the bright rounded curves of his horns, the stark lines of his narrow hips, that amazing stretch of his throat. His external whatever the fuck it is twitches and swells against his fingers every time he strokes over it, and when he trails his fingers down to the dark slit beneath it his eyes lid shut and his throat moves, emphatically. He's probably squeaking too. His lips move and his hands are more urgent, they move faster, and he's twisting into himself, rolling back and forth in place as he squeezes the substantial length of his alien junk and slips two fingers up inside himself, then, with a sharp convulsion, three. His face almost looks like he's in pain, but he can't possibly not be enjoying this. He's shaking a little, and his jaw works as he mouths something. He's talking to himself. God, why didn't she make sure the goggles had sound? She wants desperately to be there with him, touching where he touched, hearing him call her name, the sounds that his body makes as his fingers go in and out of himself and his breaths get so ragged and his face goes rosy all over. But at least he's looking at her.

Finally he does-- too much of something, enough, and his whole body snaps into a taut arch up off the steps. His eyes go so wide, locked on to hers, and he shakes like he's just gotten electrocuted, like he's going to fall apart. He stops breathing entirely for one long twitchy moment and then slumps back with gasp and a sigh, utterly limp for the first time she's seen him. Dark red pools between his legs, his slack fingers, dripping down from one step to the next in bright streaks, and she can only hope that doesn't mean he's bleeding out. His smile is soft and goofy and entirely adorable, and she is breathless and warm as toast all over.

GG: you're really beautiful, karkat.  
  
GG: did you know that?

He startles at that, and then reaches out with his drier hand and taps at the keyboard. His arm is kind of trembly, and his face is weird and wobbly, all fangs and red-gray cheeks she actually has no idea what he's thinking.

CG: OF COURSE I KNEW  
  
CG: I AM MAGNIFICENT IN EVERY RESPECT.  
  
GG: oooh mister karkat oooh  
  
CG: DAMN STRAIGHT.

He sits up completely and sort of inches away from the red gunk all over the steps. His larger than average troll junk gets smaller, bit by bit, and he kind of rubs at it with the heel of his hand until it tucks itself completely away into the grey-black shadows between his legs, and then he grabs his underwear to wipe up the mess. Jade rests her head in her palms and just watches the way his shoulder blades slide around his back as he moves around, then grimaces at the soggy fabric and captchalogues it anyway. He's much slower now than he had been, and when he wrestles his pants back on he yawns, long and just like a cat, a big flash of teeth and an unfurling of tongue, a mouth that goes so very wide.

He slides his shirt back on, his horns glinting like candy corn against the darkness of black fabric and black hair, and when he's got his arms back through the sleeves he kind of shimmies himself all over to settle his clothes, just like a bird ruffling its feathers, and then slumps against the wall of the stairwell. His big pretty eyes are heavy-lidded and kind of dreamy. She wants to bundle him up in her arms and keep him forever. She wants so many things she hasn't quite figured out how to have, yet.

CG: SO HOW WAS IT, DUCHESS?  
  
CG: IMPRESSED?

She grins, and watches him watching her watching him. He smiles back, and his eyes slip closed. He jerks back awake, convulsively, and then fights off another enormous yawn.

GG: extremely impressed, you wild alien stallion ;P  
  
GG: now go take a nap before you fall down the stairs ok?  
  
CG: I AM AN UNSTOPPABLE SEXUAL DYNAMO I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW  
  
CG: I DON'T SLEEP.  
  
GG: suuuuure, karkat!  
  
CG: FUCK YOU I'M SERIOUS. I HAVE SO MUCH IMPORTANT LEADER TYPE STUFF TO LAY DOWN AROUND THIS PLACE IT IS LIKE YOU DON'T EVEN FUCKING KNOW.  
  
CG: I'M JUST GONNA SIT HERE FOR A SECOND TO MAKE SURE  
  
CG: THAT  
  
CG: YOU'RE OKAY.  
  
CG: YOU'RE OKAY, RIGHT? THAT WASN'T TOO, UH,  
  
CG: ALIEN?  
  
GG: i'm not gonna lie, karkat, that was really fucking alien.  
  
CG: OH.  
  
GG: but it was so cool, and next time i'm gonna make sure that my goggles have sound on them because if you sound as awesome as you look there is no way i'm missing out on that!  
  
CG: NEXT TIME.

His eyes lid all the way shut, and he relaxes again, huddled into himself in a sleepy puddle of black shirt and gray everything else and soft slack mouth. His fingers move so slowly.

CG: COOL.

And he's definitely out. Jade gets to her feet, startled at the soreness that has built up in her lower back and shoulders, and slides down the giant roots of the baobab into a snowdrift. White stuff flurries up everywhere, powdery and sweetly cold, and she lies in the drift for a long moment, wondering at the heat churning inside her skin.

Next time, she thinks, yes, next time: goggles with sound, and somewhere warm she can take her own shirt off.


End file.
